Feb. 4, 2010

After serving two years a captain of the Lafayette women’s basketball team, Jessica Spicer was 40 minutes from
seeing her collegiate career come to a close. At least, that is what most people thought when the Leopards took the floor on Mar. 7, 2009 for the first round of the Patriot League Women’s Basketball Tournament.

Spicer and her teammates saw things differently.

Sure, she had seen her team lose 81 times since starting her collegiate career. Sure, her team had just lost by 21 points seven days earlier, against the very same American team they were now playing in the tournament. And so what if the Leopards had lost 10 straight games the close the regular season?

It was all a fresh start for Spicer and her teammates.

“Nobody really had any reason to believe in us,” Spicer said. “Outside of our locker room, I’m pretty sure no one did. But you know what? None of those people concerned us. Every last one of us, particularly the seniors, knew what we were capable of doing. We all went out and played for each other. Basketball is too great of a game to not go out having fun.”

And for five glorious days, the Lafayette women’s basketball team had the time of its life. The Leopards produced a run that was unrivaled in the Patriot League Tournament. With each dramatic basket and each dramatic victory, the Lafayette campus and the Easton community began to embrace the Leopards and the character that each player showed. Leadership and resolve can get lost in 81 defeats, but it rose to the top in Lafayette’s run to the title game.

After 40 minutes of the Patriot League Tournament, Spicer’s career was not over. Instead, she was sitting at a podium in the depths of Stabler Arena, describing her love for her teammates and how an eight-win team was
suddenly in the thick of a championship race.

Twenty-four hours later, what had started as an improbable upset became an unthinkable tournament run. The Leopards knocked off Navy to become the first team in history to advance to the championship game of the eight-team Patriot League Tournament as the No. 7 seed.

“We took the same attitude into the second game that we took into the first game,” said fellow senior Emily Garner. “It’s incredibly easy to play this game when there are no expectations. We had nothing to lose.”

Suddenly, the community, the region, and even the nation began to take notice. Stories were written and told by
various scribes and media members. Adding to the buzz of the Leopards’ remarkable run was the knowledge that their championship voyage would now go through archrival Lehigh, the top-seeded team in the Patriot League.

“It was how we wanted it to be,” Garner said of the championship match-up. “Not only did we get to play our rivals, we got to play the top team in the Patriot League. If we were going to win a championship, we wanted to do it by beating the best.”

The euphoria of Lafayette’s run officially came to a close shortly after 8 p.m. on Mar. 11, 2009. After a furious rally, the Leopards fell, 64-56, in front of a raucous crowd of nearly 2,500. The Leopards’ fairytale did not include a fairytale ending.

“I wanted that game for our kids so badly,” Lafayette head coach Tammy Smith said. “To go through everything they had gone through, and then to come out and fight the way they did for the entire tournament, it was tough to see it end the way it did. But those kids did everything we asked of them and more. I couldn’t have been more proud of a team than I was of them.”

Spicer, who had ventured into the media room of Stabler Arena on two straight occasions with a bright smile and a glow that could light up a city, suddenly had to face a throng of media while drying tears.

But the tears did nothing to dampen her spirit after Lafayette’s improbable run to the title game.

"I love every one of those girls," Spicer said. "They really are like family. The toughest part was knowing I would never get to play with them again.”

"I think you always want to leave a program better than you found it," Garner said. "After the way we ended the
regular season, the five of us seniors looked at each other and said this isn't the way we want to end it. We played with our heads and our hearts together in the tournament. It was one of the proudest moments of my life, and one that I will never forget.”